Foreigners are not allowed to work in Japan unless they have an appropriate Japanese work visa. There are a few ways to get one. Some of the more common ways to get the work visa are as follows.

Marry a Japanese citizen. If you can find that special someone, then he or she should be able to help you with all the paperwork for your work permit.

Get a working holiday visa. Depends on your age and country of citizenship. (E.g. New Zealanders under 30 can get these visas.) Contact your Japanese embassy for details.

Get an employer-sponsored visa. This is what I did. There’s more information on this website.

In general, if you have a dependent visa (for example, if you are married to a work visa holder), you are not allowed to work. After all, if you can work then you are not really dependent on the other person. However, it is possible for dependent visa holders to get a part-time work permit — see the Dependent Visa page on this website for more.

335 comments on “Visa Eligibility”

I got married to a japanese national who’s younger than me, 2010 May, I received the Certificate of Eligibility August of the same year, 2010, I don’t know how my husband did the process to speed up the release of my COE, so I within the same year I was able to come here in Japan hassle-free, I am a Philippine national.

Konnichiwa,
I’m from Nepal and I live in Japan with my family for almost 10 year(parmanent Recident)I work full time work (khaisine).I wold like to call some of my reletive in japan for work.for this all what is nessesary things and about how much bank deposit do I have make and some other must important paper.
If you don’t mind could you give some informaition by mail.
Looking forward to hear your kind advice thank you.

hi , i am from nepal and now working in india for five years.my work depart is hospitality and now i want work in japan to get more money.how is the visa prcces and job in japan for nepali people..thank you !